History Literature / AncillaryJustice

* OfThePeople: In the language of the Radchaai, "Radchaai" is synonymous with "civilization". Outsiders (aside from aliens or [[NoTranshumanismAllowed transhumans]]) can become citizens and thus proper people, but only through being conquered by the Radch.

* NoOSHACompliance: The ancient glass bridges on Nilt are kilometers high yet lack railings.

** In addition to apparently being an EarWorm, the first song even suffers a {{Mondegreen}} in universe at the hands of an inebriated Bo Ten. The original isn't in the Radchaai language, so she improvises something with phonetically similar words. This song comes to represent the Fleet Captain not knowing where her ass is.

* InsignificantLittleBluePlanet: Humanity's birthplace is known, it's just... unimportant.

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: In ''Ancillary Mercy'', [[spoiler: the antagonistic instant of Anaander Mianaai is so brutal in the name of maintaining control of Athoek Station that ''no one'' is willing to talk frankly with her. So she misses out on a hell of a lot of important information--for example, that Tisarwat is dangerous, or that Basnaaid would be good leverage against Breq.]]

* DecoyProtagonist: Played with, in a way. [[spoiler: The flashbacks focus on the perspective of the ancillary One Esk, who was assigned to Lieutenant Awn, while Breq in the present is from the perspective of One Esk Nineteen, who was ordered to escape the ship before its destruction. Although given the nature of the ancillaries and AIs they are technically just different parts of the same person, Justice of Toren.]]

* BenevolentAI: Station's main concern is always the well-being of its residents. Also ship AIs in general: even otherwise antagonistic warships are shown to care deeply about their crew. In the second and third books, Station is deeply distressed (and has been for ''years'') about not being able to see and care for a significant portion of her population.

* LoveDodecahedron: There's one onboard the ''Mercy of Karl'', involving the captain, two out of three lieutenants, and the ship itself. It helps that Radchaai relationships don't seem to have an expectation of monogamy, so this isn't itself played for drama.

--->She stood there for ten minutes, quietly humming the ninth hour's devotional chant [...], while monks and the governors' assistants searched centuries of precedent. But there was, it appeared, no rule forbidding one to [[spoiler: cripple one's own teammate]].
** LoveDodecahedron: There's one onboard the ''Mercy of Karl'', involving the captain, two out of three lieutenants, and the ship itself. It helps that Radchaai relationships don't seem to have an expectation of monogamy, so this isn't itself played for drama.

** The horrific process by which people are turned into ancillaries. A HumanPopsicle wakes up, disoriented, soaking wet, choking, a medic implanting the ancillary tech in their head, struggling until suddenly they're no longer themself.
** In ''Ancillary Sword'', [[spoiler:this is probably how Anaander Mianaai turned Lieutenant Tisarwat into, well, Anaander Mianaai. Later, Breq straps the suffering Anaander/Tisarwat to an operating table to take her implants ''back out''.]]

* BlackBox: The Presger gun. Its properties are straightforward enough--cannot be detected by Radchaai sensors, will punch through 1.11 meters of nearly any kind of matter--but nobody in human space has any idea ''why'' it works that way. Bonus points for literally taking the shape of a black box when dormant. Extra bonus points for being intended as a handheld [[spoiler: ''anti-ship weapon.'']]

* BenevolentAI: Station's main concern is always the well-being of its residents. Also ship AIs in general: even otherwise antagonistic warships are shown to care deeply about their crew.

* HumanoidAbomination: The humans grown by the Presger to act as their intermediaries are... at best, dangerously unaccustomed to dealing with normal human social customs. Small things like knowing it's impolite to disembowel one's sister at the dinner table, or that people breathe for a reason. They've also either developed or been 'improved' with some physical differences from the average human; Translator Zeiat dislocates her jaw like a snake in order to swallow an oyster still in its shell,[[spoiler: and later vomits up a live fish ''more than a week'' after eating it.]]

*** Not quite; Anaander Mianaai's core personality is that of the original human, whereas the ships are computers that can simply have human bodies plugged into them. Their 'identity' is that of the ship.

* AmusingAlien: The Presger translators are this, while also being fairly terrifying. It's implied that the Presger think of humanity in the same way, for a version of 'amusing' that's reminiscent of a child laughing while pulling the legs off a bug.

* BlueAndOrangeMorality: The Presger have an odd view that anything they find 'Significant' is inviolate. They force any species they deem significant to sign treaties to enforce their view, and they have the technology and military might to ensure those treaties aren't violated without serious consequence. The treaties leave justifiable reasons to kill members of a significant species, but they are so complex and unintuitive to a human mind that most people are entirely unwilling to deal with aliens for fear of violating some seemingly-minor rule.
** Notably, their criteria for 'Significance' isn't entirely synonymous with what humans think of as 'personhood.' The fact that Translators have a constant low-key identity crisis and that Translator Zeiat seems genuinely confused by the idea that Breq [[spoiler: minus a leg]] is the same person she used to be.

* CalvinBall: The game of counters between [[spoiler: ''Sphene'' and Translator Zeiat]]

* DeadpanSnarker: Quite a few, though Breq and Anaander Mianaai are standouts.
** [[spoiler: ''Sphene'']] has them both beat.

** Almost everyone's reaction whenever Anaander Mianaai shows up or is revealed to have been involved behind the scenes. Anaander herself [[SplitPersonality is no exception]].

* ReplacementGoldfish: The ''Mercy of Kalr'' (a ship who's lost her ancillaries) almost immediately sees Breq (an ancillary who's lost her ship) as this. [[spoiler: Even to the point of lobbying to have her assigned as a replacement captain. But ultimately, it doesn't work out: it's just not the same for either of them, without Breq giving up her identity to become an ancillary again for real.]]

* TerrifiedOfGerms: A low-key religious example, but Radch religion puts a lot of emphasis on physical 'purity.' They have a nudity taboo about gloves, when it's learned that Breq has washed her hands in the temple basin it's referred to as 'polluted,' and apparently after touching a dead body everything ''they'' touch needs to be ritually cleansed by a priest. 'True' Radch inside the dyson sphere take this UpToEleven, to the extent of considering those born outside of it too impure to enter.

* AlphaBitch: Raughd Denche, full stop. She's the popular daughter of a prestigious plantation owner, who's friends laud how hilariously she can single someone out and bully them. [[Spoiler: She's [[DomesticAbuser even worse]] in private.]]

** Sure you would've, Breq... Though it's mentioned a few in ''Ancillary Justice'' that this was a habit particular to One Esk, rather than the ''Justice of Toren'' as a whole.

* AmusingAlien: The Presger translators are this, while also being fairly terrifying.

* BenevolentAI: Station's main concern is always the well-being of its residents.

* BlackBox: The Presger gun. Its properties are straightforward enough--cannot be detected by Radchaai sensors, will punch through 1.11 meters of nearly any kind of matter--but nobody in human space has any idea ''why'' it works that way. Bonus points for literally taking the shape of a black box when dormant.

* BlueAndOrangeMorality: The Presger have an odd view that anything they find "significant" is inviolate. They force any species they deem significant to sign treaties to enforce their view, and they have the technology and military might to ensure those treaties aren't violated without serious consequence. The treaties leave justifiable reasons to kill members of a significant species, but they are so complex and unintuitive to a human mind that most people are entirely unwilling to deal with aliens for fear of violating some seemingly-minor rule.

* NewsMonopoly: In ''Ancillary Mercy'', [[spoiler: Breq attacks Anaander Mianaai's forces from Tstur Palace as they move on Athoek,]] earning her three news channels worth of [[PropagandaPiece scathing]] [[MaliciousSlander coverage]], plus bulletins every five minutes on all other channels in the system.

* PerceptionFilter: The Garseddai guns have an effect like this, though in an unusual variation it affects cameras but ''not'' biological eyes.

** Sure you would've, Breq...

* TranquilFury: Breq

* SplitPersonality: [[spoiler: When Anaander Mianaai ordered the eradication of every living thing on Garsedd, the moral crisis it started within herself caused her to develop two different personalities. One saw the action as extreme but necessary and wants to continue with things as they are, the other was horrified and is actively working to reform [[TheEmpire the Radch]] and end its constant annexations and expansion. Both are trying to eradicate the other side but have been keeping things covert and subtly maneuvering people to their side for fear of the chaos an all out civil war would cause. Not to mention that all the bodies more or less share one identity, which is in denial about the whole split personality problem. And Breq is trying to jump in the middle of it and bring everything out into the open.]]

* [[TaughtByExperience The Burnt Hand Teaches Best]]: [[spoiler: Translator Zeiat uses the phrase almost verbatim to explain the Presgr's rational for aiding the Garseddai. The early translators believed that the best way to get the Raddch to stop the annexations was to show them that not only was resistance possible, it would be trivially easy for the Presgr to aid that resistance.]]
* TheOnlyWayTheyWillLearn: [[spoiler: Translator Zeiat's explanation for the reason the Presgr aided the Garseddai. The Presgr seemed to think it would somehow stop the annexations.]]

*** Not quite, Anaander Mianaai's core personality is that of the original human, whereas the ships are computers that can simply have human bodies plugged into them. Their 'identity' is that of the ship.

** [[spoiler: Then again, the various iterations of Anaander Mianaai have already committed mass murder to keep their secret ''at least'' twice, at Ime and at Ors...and those are only the incidents Breq knows about. How many people have been KilledToUpholdTheMasquerade over the last thousand years? At least now the issue is out in the open and can hopefully be resolved and finished.]]